


Dreams From Our Fathers

by Poetry



Category: Doctor Who, Torchwood
Genre: Drabble Sequence, Episode: s06e07 A Good Man Goes to War, Father-Daughter Relationship, Father-Son Relationship, Gen, Miracle Day, POV First Person, Sad
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-08-22
Updated: 2011-08-22
Packaged: 2017-10-22 23:22:54
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,019
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/243695
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Poetry/pseuds/Poetry
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Ten characters from <i>Doctor Who</i> and <i>Torchwood</i>, dreaming of their fathers.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Dreams From Our Fathers

  
**I. Rose**

I didn’t tell my other dad about my dad. My mum didn’t either. All he knew was that my dad had died when I was a baby.

Until the day he botched a negotiation with the Atraxi on Torchwood’s behalf, and the Atraxi demanded a human envoy to their ship to make up for his grievous insult.

“I’m going,” he said. “This is my responsibility.”

When he came back alive, by some miracle, I broke down in his arms and told him. He said he would’ve done the same. I believed him.

I don’t call him my other dad anymore.

 **II. Jenny**

 ****

When I set out on my own adventure across the universe, I hoped to hear legends of my father.

I did. But they weren’t always what I wanted to hear.

“He thinks he knows what’s best for the universe,” the Church recruiter says. “He topples governments that he thinks are wrong. It’s just another form of tyranny, isn’t it? If you care about justice, then you ought to enlist with us.”

That’s when the Spitfires appear.

For the first time in my life, I run away. Not because I’m scared, but because I don’t know which side to fight for.

 **III. Amy**

 ****

On a blank sheet, I write:

 _On my first day of school, Aunt Sharon drove me. She clasped me by the shoulder and told me to be a good girl and listen to my teacher. She opened the car door, let me out, then drove away._

 __

Beneath it, I write:

 _On my first day of school, my dad walked with me, hand in hand, to the door of my classroom. He told me to be Amelia, because any teacher with sense would like Amelia just the way she was._

 __

“Which one feels more real?” Rory asks, quietly.

“I don’t know.”

 **IV. Rory**

 ****

I wonder what my dad would think, if he met my _pater_.

I know my dad is my real father; his DNA makes up half of mine. But fatherhood goes beyond DNA, and my _pater_ shaped part of who I am, much as that part scares me.

My dad wasn’t disappointed that I wanted to be a nurse instead of a doctor. He supported me, but he never pushed. But maybe he should have, because it was my _pater_ who made me into a soldier.

But is it the soldier in me who protects Amy? Or is it the nurse?

 **V. River**

 ****

For nearly two millennia, my father stood vigil over the Pandorica, as penance for killing his beloved.

I’ve heard the tale many times. Every time I hear it, I wish I had the chance for that penance. If the Doctor had been sealed in a box instead of burned on a pyre at sea, and I could have lived so many years –

No. My father is a good man, who went to war for me. I know I don’t have his strength.

Instead, I’ve sealed myself away in my own prison. And I let myself escape, again and again.

 **VI. Ianto**

 ****

I started lying about my father my first year of uni.

He never could hold down a job. Looking back, I think he was bipolar. Every six months he’d quit his job, manically convinced that he could start his own business. But his credit wasn’t good enough for a loan to start one, and he’d be back on the dole.

So I started wearing suits, and he became a master tailor. It created the image of myself that I needed.

Jack doesn’t know. Perhaps I’ll tell him, one day. But so long as he keeps his mysteries, I’ll keep mine.

 **VII. Rex**

 ****

“A man has to stand up on his own,” my old man used to say.

I took his words to heart. I busted my ass to put myself through college. I built my own career. No one ever helped me, but I didn’t need help. I was strong.

Look where it’s gotten me. It wasn’t enough for my old man. I’m tied to a pole, at a weaker man’s mercy. I try to talk my way out, but my strength was never in my words.

 _Help me_ , I think, as the pen drives into my heart. _Somebody, please, help me._

 __

 **VIII. Gwen**

 ****

He doesn’t remember my wedding.

I remember thinking it was funny, at the time. It had been such a disaster that I couldn’t help but laugh at the absurdity of it. My relatives thought they’d all gotten so pissed they couldn’t remember, while Rhys and I knew the truth. Even on my wedding day, I got the chance to play hero.

Now my father is Category One. Though I don’t want to believe it, I might never hear his voice again.

I made one good decision since I poisoned my life with Torchwood, and my father will never remember it.

 **IX. Jack**

 ****

I never thought I’d die like my father.

He was a victim of war, collateral damage. I enlisted so I wouldn’t die that way. I wanted to choose what I would stake my life for.

Until the day I did give my life for something I believed in. After that, it didn’t matter what I died for.

Now that it matters again, I know I’d give my life to save Alice’s. If my life would bring back Steven’s, I’d trade it gladly. Now, when it means something, I would die for my family.

I’m not ready to die for Gwen’s.

 **X. Alice**

 ****

I tried pills, after. I even tried some alien technology my mother kept. Therapy didn’t even cross my mind. Therapists don’t have words for what I’ve been through.

Nothing helped. Nothing short of retcon would help, and I’d rather die than forget my son. So that’s what I did, in the end. I counted out the overdose, pill by pill, and went to bed.

But now it’s morning, and I’m awake. The television is calling it a miracle.

And now, after years of wondering about him, hating him, cursing him, I finally understand what it’s like to be my father.

  



End file.
